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Ammon News - Firefighters in central Chile on Sunday battled to quell fierce forest fires that have killed 112 people so far and razed entire neighborhoods, while President Gabriel Boric warned the country faces a "tragedy of very great magnitude".

Hundreds of people are still missing, authorities say, stoking fears the death toll will keep climbing as more bodies are found on hillsides and houses devastated by the wildfires.

The fires that gathered momentum on Friday now menaced the outer edges of Vina del Mar and Valparaiso, two coastal cities popular with tourists. The urban sprawl of those cities accounts for more than a million residents west of the capital Santiago.

Chilean authorities have introduced a 9 p.m. curfew in the hardest-hit areas and sent in the military to help firefighters stem the spread of fires, while helicopters dumped water to try to douse the flames from the air.

Chile's Legal Medical Service, the state coroner, said 112 people have died in the fires. The death toll stood at 51 on Saturday.

Earlier in the day Boric, announcing two days of national mourning starting on Monday, said Chile should prepare itself for more bad news.

Although wildfires are not uncommon during the Southern Hemisphere's summer, the lethality of these blazes stands out, making them the country's worst national disaster since the 2010 earthquake in which about 500 people died.

Last year, on the back of a record heat wave, some 27 people died and more than 400,000 hectares (990,000 acres) of land were affected.

Boric has sought to channel funds to the hardest-hit areas, many of which are popular with tourists.

"We are together, all of us, fighting the emergency. The priority is to save lives," Boric said.

Reuters